LIA
by Synaps
Summary: Shikamaru starts his new job with the LIA, the Leaf Intelligence Agency. There he works alongside the police on stopping the violence raging through the Fire Country. With the help of Tenten and Neji, he will do his best not to fall asleep on the job! AU.
1. Replacement, part 1

Naruto © Masashi Kishimoto

**WARNING**: Character death, violence (both are in this chapter and will be used repeatedly), possible gore and blood by the gallon. Also, there may be **future** **spoilers** for those who aren't up to date with the manga, depending on how quickly the anime progresses... Though the spoilers won't be for a while, so there's still time. There will be an individual warning at that time, so please enjoy. Oh, and since Tenten appears so little there is a hanging risk of her being OOC; there isn't much evidence to base her character on.

**Pairings: **Background NejiTen, maybe. Other stuff that may be interpreted, but isn't supposed to be romantic. I don't mind if you read stuff into it, though. As long as you're having fun ^.^

* * *

**LIA**

**Replacement, part 1**

by Synaps

* * *

Rock Lee cursed to himself, they had him cornered. He had been there on a pure coincidence; as such he hadn't been carrying his gun. Tenten kept telling him to keep it on him at all times, despite the fact that his speciality was hand-to-hand combat, but now it seemed it was to late for any of that. The enemy was heavily armed, not to mention that Lee was hurt. He'd broken his legs in the explosion. A strong metallic taste was on his lips, gluing them together. He had no idea how injured he was. He had blacked out for a while and he was unsure how long. Maybe the police was outside already, that big explosion would have drawn them there.

As far as Lee knew he was the only one alive, save for the enemy. They were moving just next to his hiding place.

It was in situations like this that Lee asked himself "What would Gai do?" Unfortunately for him, though he didn't realise it, doing everything the way Gai did was what usually landed him in trouble.

In this situation, Lee decided, he needed to fight. It was what he always did, fighting without worrying about his life. What was important was stopping the enemy. The tiny chance that any others were still alive meant that he needed to risk everything to save them. Rock Lee moved his injured leg, causing the parts of wall that had been leaning over him to crash down.

"What was that?"

Lee cursed again, he was still stuck.

"There's someone still alive here"

Good, the police must have managed the situation when he passed out back there, they would help him. Lee moved again, to make sure they knew were he was.

"Kill him, un"

-l-

The sun was awfully bright on the summer's day that Shikamaru started his job.

Shikamaru had been the last person to expect the promotion. He had failed all of their exams on purpose, in hopes that something else would save him. It was all Asuma's fault, but since Shikamaru liked his mentor he wouldn't blame him too much. Either way Shikamaru was now stuck, with no way out. His fate was worse that death.

He was working at the LIA.

The LIA, the Leaf Intelligence Agency, was notorious for the amount of overtime its agents had to put down. Useless to mention, Shikamaru hated working overtime.

He guided himself through the grand entrance of the office building, to the lifts and up two floors. He wasn't really excited; rather, he was curious about his team. The LIA generally worked in teams of three or four, though these could be broken up and tossed around at any time, if necessary for the case.

Shikamaru had decided to not try all too hard to quit. For Asuma's sake, the older man had pulled a lot of strings to land Shikamaru with the position, Shikamaru ought to at least give it a try.

Hands in his pockets and looking rather bored; Shikamaru navigated himself to the designated room.

The office he had been ordered to the day before was relatively small and contained only three desks, two of which were occupied. The female sitting in the chair closest to the window got to her feet in greeting as he entered. The male merely looked up and gave a quiet nod.

"I'm Shikamaru. I'm the new agent."

"Hi. My name is Tenten, this is Neji." The girl replied with a relaxed smile.

Tenten immediately gave of the impression of being a good person, despite vibes of sarcasm, confidence and a lack of mercy. Neji on the other hand displayed over-confidence in the way he ignored both other agents in the room; he seemed to think he was better than everyone else. Shikamaru decided to not get in his way.

She sat down and waved for him to take the empty desk.

"What" Shikamaru cleared his throat "are we working on?"

"A week ago there was a bank robbery. 19 dead, 4 injured." Neji's tone was business-like. "Our partner, Rock Lee, ended up severely injured and is currently in the hospital."

Something about the casual way he spoke about it caused shivers to go down Shikamaru's spine. He had always been close to his friends and could not imagine talking about them being hurt in such an uncaring manner. It struck him that, since he was a replacement for their teammate, there was a risk they would dislike him just for that reason. How _very_ troublesome.

On the other hand, Neji showed no signs of letting stuff like that affect him, and Tenten just seemed nice. However, as Shikamaru knew, first appearances can be deceiving. There was always a risk, he could not ignore it. Shikamaru took everything into account and prepared for 45 possible reactions, 20 steps ahead on each, just in case. If things went any other way... he'd just have to wing it. Troublesome, but reality was unlikely to go outside his predictions.

As such he took his desk and turned on the computer. Without so much as looking at him, Neji asked for his e-mail address to send the information gathered to. Thankfully nobody laughed as Shikamaru revealed his old and quite embarrassing (not that he bothered with embarrassment; that took too much energy) e-mail address; LazyCloudLover. Even though nobody even smirked, Neji's expression showed that he didn't particularly look forward to working with Shikamaru, now that he had revealed himself as a lover of lazy clouds… or just lazy.

Apparently the robbers had entered the bank during lunch hours. They had blown up the doors without anyone noticing them even going behind desks. The security cameras had shown a group of bankers no one had ever seen before, it was obvious they had posed as personnel.

"You should go down to the lab and meet Shino; after that you can work on identifying him." Neji spoke as he pointed out a blond guy with dangerously long hair (for posing as a banker, if he'd been pretending to be a rocker he'd fit right in) which the cameras had picked up quite clearly. "Computers are your area, right?" it wasn't as much of a question as it was supposed to be.

Shikamaru nodded anyway, it _was_ his area of expertise.

"Shino's down in the cellar." Tenten added. "I'll show you."

Shikamaru shrugged and followed her, even while clearing his throat. "Why can't we just call him?"

"He'll feel forgotten and sulk about it for days if we don't talk to him face-to-face once in a while." Tenten's voice held a monotone which disguised whether she was serious or not. However, given the situation, it was likely she was being truthful. How troublesome.

"Besides" she added after they'd entered the elevator "Everyone wants to meet the new kid"

Shikamaru almost added that he wasn't a kid, but thought better off it. If he showed that it ticked him off she was sure to use it as a nickname.

"What is this Shino person working on?"

"Identifying the explosive and other things he bagged at the scene." she shrugged. "Most likely some bug. No matter what case he'll always get interesting information out of bugs. I just hope we can use the information this time." Tenten sighed silently and Shikamaru got a feeling she was the only sane person there beside himself. _That_ if anything was bothersome. It seemed like she was being nice to him for that reason, the chance to be with someone rational.

"Afterwards we might head for the morgue" Tenten mused. "Not that there's likely to be anything new there, but Kabuto would want to see you too."

'_Is there anyone here who _doesn't _want to meet me?'_ Shikamaru thought, not liking being passed around like a ping-pong ball.

"Kabuto is the coroner?"

"Yes, but you'll see him sooner or later anyway, no need to search him out right away."

She quieted as the lift stopped and the doors opened, displaying a similar white hall to the one they'd exited higher up. The only difference was the lack of windows on the western wall. This was natural, given that they were under ground level.

"There's no reason to be afraid of Shino, by the way." Tenten added before he had a chance to enter the corridors. "He's a bit odd, but he's actually nice."

Shikamaru nodded, not finding anything good to use as a response. As long as Shino didn't try to kill him or make him work harder (the latter one was surely the worst, though Shikamaru had never tried either one and didn't particularly care to test either one of them out) Shikamaru would be fine with him.

-l-

Neji looked at the face still displayed on his computer screen. He did not like the fact that someone had injured his teammate, as much as he did not care for said teammate. He was silently thankful for the time of quiet that the bank robber had lent him, even as he resented himself for it. However, if Lee got himself injured it was his own fault; it was nothing to think about. If he was too weak to manage in the world he shouldn't be in it. If destiny said that Rock Lee was supposed to die, that was what would happen, you couldn't fight destiny.

So why was he even concerned about it? Someone as weak as Lee was easily replaced. What did he care?

Why did he care?

-l-

Shikamaru let out a tiny grumble of displeasure. He_ had_ been passed around like a pair of shoes at a bowling alley, just like he'd suspected. He had met everyone, from Kiba at the dog squads to Ino at interrogation. It had taken him quite some time to actually get back to his office, at which point Neji started harassing him about _doing his_ _job_. (That was where the centre of attention had lain, on "_actually working,_ _like he was being paid to do_") The LIA was just as exhausting as Shikamaru had feared. In the end he'd found a good frame of the blonde's face and sent it through a computer program which matched it against known criminals. He had put down a lot of work, but Neji still would not allow him to go home. Not until the suspect was identified. Shikamaru had a nagging feeling that when that happened they would stir up a lot of noise over it. It was likely that, no matter who he was, he meant trouble. Putting a name to the face would only mean that they could take action against him easier. That meant more work.

Shikamaru shook his head to clear it, found that impossible, and decided to take a nap. He had worked hard enough as it was, no reason to go overboard. Not that anyone else ever agreed.

-l-

Neji stared at the new member of the team. Tenten was sure that Shikamaru felt the persistent action, yet ignored it. It would have been impossible not to notice the lavender orbs on you.

"The computer _is_ running itself at this stage" she pointed out; cursing her position as the everlasting defender of the weak when Neji's stare moved on to her. It seemed like he was in a worse mood than usual. In order to satisfy his anger Tenten moved up behind Shikamaru and looked at the moving images on the screen, hoping for results. Still no luck, it seemed. In a window beside the first one fingerprints were being matched against the ones found in the bank. Tenten had no hopes that they had actually found the prints of the robbers in the mess the bank had been left in. They could have as easily been the prints of one of the many customers the bank handled every day, even though they had been taken from the inside of the safe and first off matched to make sure they did not belong to any bankers working there. Tenten had an irritating impression it would turn out to be another dead end.

"What do you think about him?" Neji unexpectedly asked, motioning at the sleeping Shikamaru.

"Well... he's no Lee." she confessed. "I miss him. Don't you?"

Neji snickered.

"We have been working together for years now" she pressed. "You've got to be worried about him."

"If he dies it's his destiny."

She gave up, knowing she wouldn't be able to push another view into Neji's mind. He was too cold-hearted.

-l-

When Shikamaru woke the results were in.

The only known alias of the bank robber with way to long hair to really pass off as a banker was Deidara, surname unknown, thanks to the bad recording procedures of the Earth Country. That was where he'd grown up, spending his first 20 years. He was 27 years old. He was also a noted terrorist.

Shikamaru stared at the results for a while, taking it in.

That noted terrorist and the organization he was currently working for had gotten their hands on a whole lot of money.

They were dealing with something more than just a bank robbery.

-l-

Upon hearing the news Neji had left to inform their boss, something that apparently needed to be done in person. It seemed like Maito Gai had a special place for Rock Lee in his heart. Or that was what Neji muttered, sounding annoyed.

Shikamaru was working on finding Deidara and the organization he was currently working for. Since Deidara switched employers often he was hard to track. However, there was a reason Shikamaru was considered a genius. Only, he wasn't. Only Asuma ever said that... Whatever.

Shikamaru placed his hands in his lap, finger to finger. He needed to clear his head.

They only knew that much. They didn't know who Deidara was working for, or what they were planning on using the money for. If he was unable to find which organization, perhaps he could follow the money? If he used his connections he would be able to see if any other government agency had tracked a terror organization which suddenly was spending a lot of money.

He should probably check if _his_ government organization had any information like that first, though. Rather than run the risk of causing an international incident. The Secret Sand was notorious for being... a bit murderous. Same thing went for the Federal Bureau of Mist (commonly known as the Bloody Mist). Really, any other agency would try to get him killed if they found out about him hacking them. (Not that he _usually _got caught, but if it happened just once it would be enough. He had gotten caught in the past, so he wasn't invincible.)

Shikamaru sighed and cleared his head again. He needed to work, as bothersome as _that_ was. If he didn't, he risked lives. How troublesome.

- To Be Continued -

* * *

**Author's note:** This "episode" was cut into at least 2 chapters, but I had originally intended it to be 1. Therefore the ending is… not that much of an ending. Sorry, but I think it worked.

As you might understand, I think of this fanfic as a TV-series. There are episodes, which are divided into such because of which antagonist appears, and there are chapters… which are chapters.


	2. Replacement, part 2

**Author's note: **Goodness, I really left you hanging for a while :( However, this was a pain to write and left me with a writer's block for some months. In either case, here it is ^.^ Sorry for taking so long, I'll work on that

* * *

**LIA**

Replacement, part 2

by Synaps

* * *

Shikamaru snapped his head up, not quite believing his eyes. One of the other robbers had been identified. Not only that, but he was a local, meaning that they probably used a facility owned by him as their hide-out. To make matters even more perfect, he owned a summer house just north of town. If Shikamaru could pick a place to use as a base for terrorism, he would pick somewhere north of Leaf City. All homes up there were separated from neighbours by a combination of trees and distance.

He needed to get a hold of Tenten, someone should be sent out there.

-l-

Deidara entered the mall, as cheerful as ever.

He had been in a sticky situation. As a hired gun he wasn't a trusted ally to the RC. Thy had hired him to get them money. As such they expected him to deliver them said money as soon as it was safe. Of course, Deidara had no plans of doing so. He had stolen the money, so it was only fair for him to take some of it. It wasn't like he was using it all on himself. No, Deidara was feeling charitable.

He was going to share the results of his hard work with the citizens of Leaf City.

-l-

Tenten watched through the binoculars of her sniper-rifle. She had positioned herself in a pine-tree, allowing her to watch over the arrest. In her ear she had a small communication-device, connecting her to the Black-Ops on the ground.

The glorified foot-soldiers finally stormed the villa, after what felt like an eternity of (necessary) preparation.

"Star 1, Star -. Do -ou copy? Ov-r." Tenten stopped herself from jumping as a nervous voice reached her ear. The static was pretty bad.

"Copy. Star 1 here. Over."

"…dead…"

-l-

Neji sighed silently. After talking to Gai for more than 20 minutes he needed a break. Actually, he was exhausted, most likely from lack of sleep. His bed had broken a few days ago (3 days, 5 hours, 49 minutes…), allowing springs to stick up and tear at his skin as he slept. Neji didn't own a couch, or even a comfortable chair. He'd spend the last few days (3 days, 5 hours, 51 minutes) sleeping on the floor. It was only slightly better than sleeping on the bed, but only slightly. He needed a new bed, he could stop by the mall and look at prices. The case was soon to be closed, they wouldn't need an interrogation expert until tomorrow. Even if they did, the girl he had been training, Yamanaka Ino, would suffice. Even though a normal agent could interrogate just as good as she could at this stage.

With that irritated thought, Neji left work. Not pausing to glare at the sleeping Shikamaru.

-l-

Shikamaru sat up in surprise. His phone was ringing. Still quite sleepy, he indulged in the task of finding the miniature cell. He'd bought the newest model as it came out last week and was beginning to regret purchasing something so tiny.

"Hello!" he almost screamed in desperation as he answered the call. "Shikamaru here!"

"It's Tenten. Bad news."

"What happened? Did anyone get hurt?"

"No-one on our side. They, the terrorists, had been murdered before we got there."

"What? How?"

"Small explosions, tiny enough not to affect the outside of the building. They had been tied up in the living room and strapped to bombs. And there's more. Their explosion expert, Deidara, is nowhere to be found. And neither are the money."

"Well, oh crap."

"Agreed. Tell Neji I'll be right back, I couldn't get a hold of him."

"He left already, I think."

"OK, I'll stop by his apartment. We'll come in an hour or so."

"Got it."

Shikamaru placed his hands together in thought. Deidara was still on the loose, he had most likely been the one to kill his accomplices. '_Why_' was a key question, but not really an important one. _'Where does a bomber go when he's quit his day-job?'_ That was the real problem.

It depended on what he was planning to do. If he was escaping, hiding, planning another attack…

Places with a lot of people were feasible for all of them. Train stations, hospitals, malls…

-l-

Neji should have known beds were awfully expensive. He'd have to be frugal for months in order to afford it, unless he asked someone for a loan. Since that was out of the question, it left the option of eating instant Ramen for a few weeks. He'd survive that. Not that he particularly enjoyed it, but he had done it before.

He sighed quietly. He had planned on going out for a snack and then returning to the office. However, as Neji quickly noticed, the place he had planned on visiting – Ichiraku's – was closed. It was the only shop which sold food at prices he would allow himself to buy at. As such the only thing left was going back to work, he refused to go home until the case was closed.

Neji turned away from the beds, knowing that he'd regret it when he had to sleep in the sofa again. Not that it was a bad sofa, but he wouldn't regret throwing it out. On fire.

As he began leaving the mall he did a double-turn. Neji wasn't sure, but it looked like that terrorist – Deidara. Neji pushed his hand into his pocket, reaching for his phone. In vain, it turned out as he found it. The cell was turned off, having used up the last of the electricity left on those poorly made batteries. It was all the more irritating, because he had just loaded it. He needed a new phone, just another thing to add to his list.

However, that was hardly an issue to deal with right now. He briefly wondered, if that was truly Deidara, what had happened to Tenten's team.

Neji followed the blonde, keeping his distance and ignoring all questions that were popping into his head. What had happened to Tenten was irrelevant, since he could do nothing about it. What was more important was stopping Deidara.

The terrorist seemed to be rushed, as he was carrying a large back-pack and walking hurriedly in the direction of the nearby central station. Undoubtedly he knew that the police were after him, though Neji took some comfort in knowing that at least Deidara didn't know about _him. _

The two of them had made their way to the station. As Deidara turned around to look at arrivals Neji became sure who it was he was following.

Deidara had a cocky look to him. Though he seemed hurried, he showed no outwards signs of stress. He even seemed to be humming a tune, though Neji was far away enough not to be able to make it out.

Neji stood, watching him, pondering his next step. If he tried to bring him alone in there was a risk of civilians getting caught in the cross-fire. If he left to find a phone he might lose the man. Neither option he fancied.

"I know you've been following me, un."

'_The problem solved itself, how rare.' _That was the first though which surged through Neji's mind as the terrorist turned to face him. Neji quickly pulled out his gun, pointing it at the other. People in the background were screaming at the sight of the gun.

"Hyuuga Neji of the Leaf Intelligence Agency!"

"I didn't ask, un."

"I wasn't talking to you."

"Oh."

"Everybody, get out of here!" He turned then to Deidara. "You're under arrest"

"Are you talking to me _now_?"

Neji ignored the idiotic comment, focusing only on the body-language of the terrorist. He was making weird movements, trying to get his back-pack off without Neji noticing.

"Stop that."

"I thought I'd do you a favour and show you my art. Not that you'd fully appreciate it. My former employer didn't, so I handed in my resignation just three hours ago. You see, true art is…"

"I don't care."

He did a sudden movement, throwing his bag onto the floor between them. It flapped open, revealing exposives.

"I've got the trigger here."

Neji cursed.

"Where was I? Yeah… true art is…"

Neji swallowed. If that trigger was pressure sensitive… he didn't have much choice.

" A BA-"

_Boom._

The small explosion that was the gun was heard and Deidara fell dead to the floor. Neji had shot him square in the face.

He ran up to the man as he fell, catching his hand just after it hit the ground, wrapping his fingers around the trigger. Not that it would have done much good, he realised afterwards. He'd acted on a reflex, but Deidara had nearly dropped it after his death.

Still, he was still alive. That was worth something. Now, if only his heart rate would drop a bit…

-l-

"You need to get a new phone!"

Tenten was yelling at Neji. Shikamaru tried to ignore it, because if he stepped up to defend the guy she'd only start harassing him. Very troublesome.

"Well, I'm going now." He said, loud enough to be heard while Tenten was catching her breath.

"You should stay" she noted. "We were planning on going out. You know, get something to eat."

"I've got some things to do. But thanks"

-l-

"He's going to be alright, with time. He took a gunshot to the chest (and broke some bones), it's a pure miracle that he survived at all. That said, he did lose a lot of blood and was in critical state for quite a while." the doctor explained, placing locks of pink hair behind her ears.

"Thank you" Shikamaru said. "Can I see him?"

Dr Haruno Sakura looked down on her clipboard to verify her memory's correctness before answering.

"Just don't take too long. And try not to get him existed. Stress is _very_ bad for him right now… Though it'll take another miracle for him not to get excited about everything" she muttered the last part, both irritated and worried.

Shikamaru nodded, took a calming breath and entered the hospital room.

"Hi, I'm Nara Shikamaru, your replacement."

* * *

**Author's note: **I'm almost a bit sad. So many close calls, yet they all survived. Well, except Deidara. But you couldn't honestly have expected him to survive? Still, I was so mean to him :( He's one of my favourite characters. I'll just have to kill of Neji as revenge ^.^


End file.
